They forget who they are, and usually block the pain and death that comes with the experience of war. As seen in All Quiet on the Western Front by Erich Maria Remarque, Paul Baumer explains, “We want to live at any price; so we cannot burden ourselves with feelings which, though they may be ornamental enough in peacetime, would be out of place here” (139). Paul and many of the other soldiers have had to make themselves prone to the horrors of war, which results in many them having to dehumanize themselves. Paul also describes a form of dehumanization by saying, “We march up, moody or good-tempered soldiers--we reach the zone where the front begins and become on the instant human animals” (56). If Paul and his fellow soldiers on the front were to let the effects of war get to them, they would have not have lasted as long as they did. The soldiers had to force themselves to become different people to save themselves and others who surrounded them. In Brian Turner’s memoir, My Life as a Foreign Country, he also expresses the way that the war dehumanized him as well. Turner says, “We are surrounded by the dead, and by parts of the dead” (1). This
They forget who they are, and usually block the pain and death that comes with the experience of war. As seen in All Quiet on the Western Front by Erich Maria Remarque, Paul Baumer explains, “We want to live at any price; so we cannot burden ourselves with feelings which, though they may be ornamental enough in peacetime, would be out of place here” (139). Paul and many of the other soldiers have had to make themselves prone to the horrors of war, which results in many them having to dehumanize themselves. Paul also describes a form of dehumanization by saying, “We march up, moody or good-tempered soldiers--we reach the zone where the front begins and become on the instant human animals” (56). If Paul and his fellow soldiers on the front were to let the effects of war get to them, they would have not have lasted as long as they did. The soldiers had to force themselves to become different people to save themselves and others who surrounded them. In Brian Turner’s memoir, My Life as a Foreign Country, he also expresses the way that the war dehumanized him as well. Turner says, “We are surrounded by the dead, and by parts of the dead” (1). This